How an 82-year-old lady picked up an extra $451,000 when selling AND buying!!

How an 82-year-old lady picked up an extra $451,000 when selling AND buying!!

In 1986, a lady by the name of Carol bought a property from me. It was back when I had my real estate office in Auburn. Two months ago she called me and asked if I would be interested in helping her elderly mum whose name was Lucy.

Of course, I was delighted to help. After 30 years I was proud that they remembered me and trusted me to advise them on how to sell for the highest price and buy for the lowest price.

Here’s what happened: The local agents told Lucy that her home was worth about $1,700,000. By engaging one of our ‘Jenman Approved’ agents (from out-of-the-area), we managed to get Lucy the incredible sum of $1,950,000. AN EXTRA $250,000!!

Last week, I went to an auction with Lucy to bid on her behalf for a home in a nearby suburb that she dearly wanted to buy. Lucy and I worked out that the maximum price she could pay was $1,401,000 – that’s right, we worked it out to the last cent.

I bought the home at auction for $1,200,000. Lucy SAVED A WHOPPING $201,000!!

In total, through buying and selling with my assistance and the help of one of our ‘Approved’ agents, LUCY WAS $451,000 BETTER OFF!! She couldn’t get the smile off her face.

Now, sure, while I enjoyed helping this dear lady, I could not believe the incompetence and stupidity of the agents who handled the auction of the home we bought. At no stage did they ask either myself or Lucy what was the HIGHEST we could pay. No, like most agents, especially with auctions, they focussed on the LOWEST the sellers would accept – which turned out to be more than $200,000 below what we would have paid.

I felt so sorry for the owners. I mean, seriously, how long would it take the average family to save two hundred thousand dollars? Ten years? No, not a chance; more like 20 years. And so, just because they had no experience at selling real estate, they made the mistake that thousands of sellers make – they put their home to auction.

If only they had read any of my books – not even the entire book. If they had just read the chapters on auctions, they would almost certainly be more than two hundred thousand dollars better off today.

Indeed, in this case, they would have been better off if they had used NO agent rather than using the incompetent/stupid auction agent.

So, if you are thinking of selling how can I help you just as I helped Lucy?